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Latimer's Knoll
Easement on 104 acres on the Fredericksburg battlefield, donated in 2004 On the morning of December 13, 1862, while a portion of the Union army prepared to attack Marye’s Heights, just beyond the town of Fredericksburg, Federal assault columns south of town stepped off on another attack. They would need to traverse open fields, cross a set of railroad tracks, and move up a gentle slope to reach their objective. Facing them were Confederate infantry, backed up by artillery. One of these artillery positions, known as the Bernard Cabins site, had been acquired by the National Park Service, but an adjacent knoll remained in private hands. In 2004, the owner put an easement on this property and donated it to the CVBT.
This very dramatic terrain accommodated a battery of guns under Major Joseph W. Latimer. From this vantage point, the Confederate gunners fired on the columns of Brigadier General John Gibbon’s Federal division as they charged across a farm that would come to be called the Slaughter Pen. In 2007, the CVBT transferred its easement to the National Park Service.
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